Feb 17, 2007, - Mt Cashmere

Riding up Tumwater Canyon on my road bike Friday I was reminded how quickly winter turns to spring on the east side. Skinning up the base of Mt Cashmere with some friends the following day simply reitterated this sad truth.

Four of us left 8-mile campground shortly after 9:00 am, admittedly with some low expectations of skiing but looking forward to climbing high into the peaks of the east cascades on a beautiful blue-bird day. As we began the skin up the base of Mt Cashmere we soon congregated at one of the many exposed downed trees and various other leg-breaking forms of vegetation to discuss heading on. It was only 10:30 and the snow down low was remarkably soft, so soft that at times our poles would easily sink two feet into the hollowing snow. Would we even be able to safely descend this at 4:00 in the afternoon after it's had all day to bake in 45-50 degree temps?

So of course we continued. This was my first time up Cashmere and as we climbed I was quickly reminded how sweet of a spot this really is. With views of Mt Stuart, the Enchantments, the Cannon Mountain coulior, big mountain skiing was the talk of the climb. As was the heat. It felt more like summer then February.

But as we ascended the snow firmed up and the threat of losing a leg to the snow snakes deminished. There was no goal of bagging the peak but instead getting some north-facing runs with hopes of finding decent snow.  As we neared our high point of just over 7,000 ft, we were reminded that even in these conditions, with no new snow in weeks, an avi danger still exists. A couple of us heard numerous whoomps and one started a very small wet slide. It only had a 6 inch crown but it was enough to influence our decisions on where to ski.

We ended up dropping into some north-facing slopes below a false summit and to all of our amazement, the snow was remarkably good. There was about a foot of soft, somewhat heavy, but stable powder...far exceeding our expectations. We lapped the 500+ ft run twice, not wanting to ski too far into the drainage.

All really good things must come to an end and inevitably we had to ski out the sunny slopes we skinned up. For the top 2000 feet we were once again pleasantly surprised by the enjoyable spring skiing. It was the last 1000 feet of wet sketchy side-sloping that really sucked. Survival skiing at its best.

Unfortunately only one picture survived before my compact flash card called it quits.

Ian